


You Mess With the Robin, You Get the Superboy

by incorrectbatfam



Series: Dick and Dami Week 2021 [1]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU (Comics), Super Sons (Comics)
Genre: Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Tumblr: Dick and Dami Week
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-07
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-13 02:15:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,071
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29894106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/incorrectbatfam/pseuds/incorrectbatfam
Summary: After saying some hurtful words, Dick finds himself facing something worse than an upset assassin brother.~Dick and Dami Week day 1: #JustSiblingThings | English as second language |“Did you really mean that?”
Relationships: Dick Grayson & Damian Wayne, Dick Grayson & Jonathan Samuel Kent & Damian Wayne, Jonathan Samuel Kent & Damian Wayne, Minor or Background Relationship(s)
Series: Dick and Dami Week 2021 [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2197983
Comments: 4
Kudos: 134
Collections: DickAndDamiWeek2021





	You Mess With the Robin, You Get the Superboy

Damian flipped through the hefty case file as he descended one of the Manor’s many secret passageways, Titus trotting at his heel. At the Batcave’s entrance, he instructed the dog to wait outside. He scanned the area until his eyes fell upon his brother reclining in a desk chair holding his personal phone. Damian opened his mouth to call out when the conversation reached his ears, forcing him to stop dead in his tracks.

“I don’t know if he’s acting like this to make my life harder or if that’s just who he is.”

Damian furrowed his brow. It couldn’t be about _him_ , could it?

“Well, yeah, League of Assassins and all. All I’m saying is it’s difficult to be around him right now, what with Bruce not around and like…”

Dick’s sigh echoed through the cave like a lone breeze. Crouching at the top of the cold iron stairwell, Damian blinked back the hot mist in his eyes. A small lump formed in his throat, which he swallowed in favor of remaining silent and listening from the shadows. The person on the other end of the phone replied, but he couldn’t make out who it was, let alone what they were saying.

“Exactly! He is so much work. Can you blame a guy for wanting a break?”

Damian pursed his lips. Was this how Dick really felt? Was Damian just an added responsibility, like he was to Mother and Father? 

Wheels squeaked as Dick rolled the battered swivel chair to a mini-fridge covered in Superman magnets. 

Phone pressed between his shoulder and ear, he cracked open a soda can and took a sip. “You think if I ask Jason he’ll take the kid off my hands?”

There was a short garble.

“Yeah, you’re right,” he said. “How about Kate? She can handle anyone.”

Something inside Damian cracked—a thin, practically invisible breakage on a porcelain dish. He silently slipped out of the Cave amidst Dick’s rant, ignoring Titus wagging his tail.

Thankfully, he had a spare uniform in the back of his wardrobe. He hastily threw it on and slid his katana into its sheath, his vision growing blurrier by the second. The weight in his chest threatened to crush his lungs. His stomach churned. He threw his phone and communicator onto the bed before opening the window.

A rushing gale blew the hood off his head and rushed through his spiked locks as he hopped over the fence and grappled onto the nearest building. Cement scraped against rubber soles as he sprinted across the rooftops. 

_Difficult to be around._

_So much work._

_Take the kid off my hands._

Each word punched him in the stomach, demanding to make their presence felt almost as though they were competing to see who could be the worst of the worst.

But none of that mattered. What mattered was the fact that his brother didn’t want him. The brother known for his big golden heart and sunny smile. If his own _family_ thought he was a liability, then who in the world would bother putting up with him? 

South Burnside was where he stopped, on top of an apartment surrounded by the brittle yellow products of a failed urban garden initiative. Not a single light shone through the building’s array of windows, and not a single footstep echoed from the street. He found no solace in the buzzing moths or humming electrical box. Damian turned an empty crate over and plopped down.

_Don’t cry. That’s exactly the sort of weakness that made you a flawed fighter to Mother._

_Don’t cry. That’s exactly the type of material Father could use to strip you of your Robin privileges._

_Don’t cry. That’s exactly what makes you difficult to handle in Grayson’s eyes._

Despite repeating the mantra like a broken record, a tear escaped his domino mask and rolled down his cheek and hit the crate’s slats, turning the wood into a muddy brown from its light chestnut. Another followed. Then another. He dug the heels of his arms into his eyes, the kevlar gloves soaking up the warm droplets. What was he but an _unwanted_ abomination? A single sob escaped his lips.

It echoed.

And echoed.

Through the concrete jungle, down the decrepit alleyways, it echoed.

It echoed along the near-barren interstate, invisible to the naked ear. It echoed past grain fields that were oh-so-still in the dead of night.

It echoed across city lines into the bedroom of one Jonathan Samuel Kent, who bolted up from his sleep.

_Damian needed him._

Jon didn’t even bother checking the time as he changed into his Superboy sweatshirt and tied the pepper-red cape over his shoulders. He slipped his phone in his back pocket and left a scrawled note on his pillow because he was absolutely making enough noise to wake his father. Cold glass met his warm hand as he pushed the window open and shot toward the starless sky.

Finding Damian wasn’t hard—all he had to do was follow the sound of quickening sobs. Each one tore into him like scissors tearing up fabric. He only knew the sound of it from the time he saw Damian cry over an animal shelter PSA, but other than that, Damian Wayne was as stone-cold as the Bats came. Damian probably wasn’t watching a PSA right now, so whatever caused this had to be something really terrible. 

He spotted his best friend sitting on an overturned crate on a junk-covered rooftop, his face buried in his hands. As quietly as possible, Jon touched down. As expected, the slightest noise drew the Robin’s attention.

Damian scoffed. “What are you doing here, Kent?”

Jon scanned Damian. The tough exterior was about as thick as an eggshell. He couldn’t detect much under the mask, but Damian’s cheeks were red and splotchy. His bottom lip hadn’t quite stopped quivering, even with the snarky greeting. 

A lot of options ran through Jon’s head. Should he start with small talk? Should he go straight for a hug? No, no, those wouldn’t do. This was _Damian_ , after all.

He opened his mouth. “What happened?”

“Nothing of your concern,” Damian said.

Jon flipped another crate and scooted closer. “It’s okay if you don’t feel like talking, but I hope you know I want to help.”

Maybe it was something he said, he wasn’t sure. But something about the sentence set Damian off like a crack causing a dam to burst. Jon wrapped his arms around Damian, rubbing small circles in time with the hiccups. 

“Nobody wants me.”

To say his heart shattered would’ve been an understatement. “Who told you that?”

“I-I heard Grayson talking on the phone,” Damian said. “He said I was too much work and wanted to pawn me off to someone else.”

Jon clenched his jaw. “He’s wrong. I don’t care if he’s Batman or whatever, he’s _wrong_. You’re my best friend and you are _wanted_. Anyone who says otherwise is a bitter, crotchety old man. Next thing you know, your brother’s gonna be yelling at me to get off his lawn. Right, Dami?”

That elicited a chuckle—which for Damian might as well be a full-blown laughing fit. He wiped his eyes on the corner of his cape. “No real names on the field.”

“Jokes on you, we’re not on a field, we’re on a roof.”

Damian rolled his eyes. “I see you’ve inherited the awful Kryptonian quips.”

“Don’t you mean _Quip_ -tonian?” Jon asked.

“I am going to dropkick you off this roof.”

Jon smiled. _There’s_ the Damian he knows. Now to take care of one more thing. His feet left the ground.

“Where are you going?” Damian asked.

“Uh… bathroom,” Jon said. “I’m gonna try to find one that doesn’t smell as bad as the rest of this city.”

“ _Tt_ , good luck with that.”

As he soared over the Gotham skylines, he recalibrated his hearing to a different sound—a heartbeat, and a racing one at that. Cape flapping in the wind, he followed the patterned lubdubdub all the way to the Upper East Side. 

It converged with a voice frantically calling Damian’s name. Er, Robin, technically. Jon spotted Dick Grayson perched on top of a Wayne Enterprises billboard like a mother hawk. Even from a hundred feet up, he heard the adrenaline coursing through the Batman’s veins and the panic slipping through his voice—something he’s witnessed that his dad hadn’t. 

Heat rushed up Jon’s neck and through his face before concentrating itself in the back of Jon’s retinas. He touched the end of the narrow ledge with a balled fist.

Like Damian, Dick noticed Jon and reacted first. “Superboy! Oh, thank God, just the guy who can help me. Robin’s disappeared without his phone or communicator and—wait, what are you doing in Gotham? And why do you look like that?”

“I dunno.” Jon bared his teeth. “Why don’t you ask yourself, you Dick?”

“Alright,” Dick said, “I can see you’re upset. Mind telling me why?”

“You know what you did.” Jon cracked his knuckles. “Revenge is usually Damian’s thing, but I might make an exception this time.”

Dick took a couple of steps back and reached for his belt. “Look, kid, I don’t wanna fight you. Can we calm down and talk before anyone gets hurt?”

“Talking’s what made this mess in the first place! Damian cried because of you and you want me to calm down?”

Before Dick could respond, a red-hot beam struck the surface between his feet.

“Wait,” Dick said. “Tell me what I did so I can fix it.”

“He heard you on the phone. You called him difficult and made him think you didn’t want him. How do you plan on fixing that, _Grayson_?” 

Another laser brushed the black cape. Dick flipped out of the way. “I swear, it’s not what it seems!”

“You sure? ‘Cause it seemed like you wanted to get rid of him.” Jon slowly stalked toward Dick as though the ghost of an assassin possessed his body. “Yes or no: you said he was difficult and a ton of work.”

“Yes, but—”

He grabbed Dick’s shirt and twisted. “And yes or no: you talked about pawning him off to one of your other family members.”

“Yes.”

“ _Did you really mean that?_ ”

“No!” Dick’s hand wrapped around Jon’s arm, trying to wrench free, but the seasoned Gotham hero was nothing against the furious half-Kryptonian child. “I mean, yes, I said that, but it’s not true! I was stressed out and said some stuff in the heat of the moment, but I wouldn’t trade Damian for anything, I swear!”

“Just ‘cause you’re stressed doesn’t mean you can say that kind of stuff. Words _hurt_.”

Somebody stepped on the end of Jon’s cape. He let go of Dick, who stumbled but ultimately caught himself. Jon found himself face-to-face with a peeved-off Damian.

“And just _what_ were you trying to accomplish, Kent?”

The anger left his body. Jon rubbed the back of his neck, averting his gaze from the deadly Bat-Glare. “Uh… revenge?”

“ _Tt_ , vengeance is for deeds that warrant it, not petty conflicts.”

“But he hurt you!” Jon said. “He made you _cry_.”

“As much as I appreciate the effort, that is something I must face, not you.”

Dick stepped forward and took off the cowl. He kneeled to Damian’s height. “You guys are both right, even if you went about things the wrong way.” He placed a hand on Damian’s shoulder. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said those things, regardless of if you had have heard them or not. You’re my little brother, Damian. Nothing in the universe can change that, and I will _always_ want you around.”

Damian looked up, and for the first time, Jon saw the eyes of a kid. A kid who just wanted to feel like he belonged.

“Really?” Damian asked.

“Really,” Dick said. He opened his arms. “Bring it in?”

Damian scoffed but let go of Jon’s cape and ran into his brother’s arms.

Jon whistled under his breath. “I’m just gonna go…”

“Oh yeah, your dad called, but I was too busy looking for Damian,” said Dick. “Would it help if I vouched for you? You were a good friend to Damian tonight, it’s the least I can do.”

“… It might.”

Dick chuckled. “I’ll text him. You should head home though.”

Damian placed a hand on Dick’s arm and nodded. “As should we.”


End file.
